


Coming Back for Love

by ceealaina



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-18
Updated: 2019-11-18
Packaged: 2021-02-08 11:13:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,017
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21475072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ceealaina/pseuds/ceealaina
Summary: Tony is physically older than Steve by at least a decade, but Steve was actually born more than 50 years before Tony and fought in WWII alongside Tony's father. Steve tries to forge a friendship between them, while having to reconcile this difference in experience and Tony's own issues with his father. Just when Steve finally makes some headway, he encounters a new problem when he realizes he's developed feelings for a man who is both older and younger than him.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 6
Kudos: 28
Collections: Mind The Age Gap Flash Fic Prompt Meme





	Coming Back for Love

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [agegapflashficpromptmeme](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/agegapflashficpromptmeme) collection. 

> This prompt absolutely took over my brain and was... much more than I could write in a week when I also had to essays and an extended assignment. 
> 
> So here is the first part, to fulfill my prompt, with more coming eventually!

When Steve first woke up after crashing the Valkyrie, it was to a room full of noise. There were machines beeping, and waves of voices, indistinguishable from one another. Steve’s pulse was roaring in his ears, and he kept his eyes closed for a long time, trying to distinguish one voice from another, to try and figure out where he was. He had no idea how long he’d been under, no idea who might have found him, and he needed to assess the situation before he made any kind of move. 

They were speaking English, at least, which seemed to bode better than if they’d all been speaking German. He forced himself to focus, trying to pick a voice and to figure out what they were saying, but his brain felt like it was working on half speed. 

And then someone spoke, right by his head, and Steve’s pulse spiked as relief washed over him. The cadence was off, somehow, but he  _ knew _ that voice, warm and familiar. He was with friends, it was fine. Everything was going to be fine. 

He opened his eyes. 

It took them a long moment to focus, filmy after being closed for so long, but when they did, Steve found himself staring up into familiar brown eyes. 

“Fuck me sideways,” he said, eyes widening when he realized that Steve was staring back at him. And Steve felt like he should be admonishing him for cursing like that because this wasn’t the setting, but he found his lips curving up into a smile instead, relief making him giddy. He looked older — how long  _ had _ he been out anyway? — and different somehow, but Steve knew those eyes, blinking down at him with mostly hidden worry. 

“Howard?” he croaked out. 

The change was immediate. Howard’s gaze shuttered, and then he was pulling away entirely, out of Steve’s line of sight. It was irrational, but Steve panicked at the loss of something familiar and he struggled to sit up, ignoring the shouts of protest from around the room. A wave of dizziness washed over him vision blacking out momentarily. When it cleared, he found Howard standing across the room, fiddling with some machines that looked like a serious upgrade to what Steve had seen him working on last. His back was to Steve, and he felt a warning chill slide up his spine. 

Then he turned around, and Steve felt his heart sink. It wasn’t Howard at all. He looked eerily like him, but it wasn’t him. 

“Sorry, Cap,” the man said with a tight, fake grin, and he was a Stark, he had to have been. Did Howard have a brother? “You’re about twenty years too late.” 

Steve blinked at him, trying to decipher what that meant, and before he could speak, not-Howard was clapping the shoulder of one of the men in lab coats. 

“Thanks for sneaking me in,” he murmured, low enough that Steve wasn’t sure he was supposed to have heard. His eyes cut over to Steve, and for just a moment he would have said that look he gave him was tinged with hurt. “Wouldn’t have missed it for anything.”

The lab tech or doctor or whomever he was looked absolutely thrilled at the attention. “Of course, Mr. Stark. Any time.” 

“Wait!” Steve called, a little frantic because the man _was_ a Stark, but nothing was making any sense. “Wait, but… You do know Howard?” 

The man sighed, hesitating by the door. Steve could see how tense the lines of his back were, heard his sigh as he drew in a long breath. There was a moment before he turned, mouth tight in a not-quite-smile. 

“Howard was my dad.”

Steve stared at him blankly. His  _ father _ ? This man easily had about ten years on Steve. If Howard was his father…

While Steve was gaping at him, the man had turned to leave. But he stilled a moment longer, casting a glance back over his shoulder at him, eyes pained. “Nice to meet you, Cap.” 

***

After, when the physicals, and bloodwork, and psychiatry exams were done, when Steve had been told just how long he’d been frozen and been given time to process, and when he’d learned that Howard’s son was named Tony, was smarter than his father even and had a similar reputation, he kept hoping the other man would come back. It was ridiculous, maybe. He didn’t know Tony, had “died” about twenty-five years before he was even born. The man didn’t owe him anything. But he felt adrift, everything and everyone he’d known lost to him. And while he wasn’t having trouble adapting, sometimes the disconnect between this world and the one he’d grown up in left him reeling. As tenuous as it was, Tony was his one connection to the past. And obviously he’d known something about Steve, to risk sneaking in to be there when he woke up. Steve had thought he might come back again, tell him about his father, give him something to hold on to. 

But he didn’t hear from the man. And when Steve finally looked Tony up on the internet, he couldn’t help wondering if that was maybe for the best.

The next time Steve saw Tony was in Stuttgart, in his ridiculous, flashy suit of armor. The man was rude, antagonistic, biting out little remarks that were meant to rile. Steve knew he was trying to wind him up, but he’d never been one for staying quiet. He couldn’t help snapping back at him, the two of them at constant odds with each other. Tony had apparently inherited Howard’s tendency toward showboating, but with none of the genuine enthusiasm for the work, and it rankled. He didn’t wish the man harm — he’d never forget the feeling of watching Tony fall from the sky, and the wave of relief that had gone through him when the man’s eyes had happened had nearly dropped him to his knees — but he couldn’t see himself on a proper team with the man. So when SHIELD offered him the spot in DC, he took it.


End file.
